The Young Turks - TYT Interviews 2024 Republican Presidential Candidate Vivek Ramaswamy (FULL INTERVIEW)

Episode Date: October 20, 2023

2024 Republican Presidential Candidate Vivek Ramaswamy joins Cenk and Ana to discuss his relationship with Donald Trump, his ongoing feud with competitor Nikki Haley, what he would do as POTUS and more! Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to the Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome, thank you. Welcome to the Young Turks, Anna Kasparian and Jank Yugar with you. Joining us now is GOP presidential candidate Vivek Ramoswamy, who is pretty new to this political arena. We've now seen him in two separate GOP primary debates, and we welcome him to the show. Welcome, Vivek. It's good to see, guys.

How are you? We're doing good, we're doing good. All right, let's get right in. There's a lot to get to here. We'll talk a little bit about your policies. We'll talk a little bit about how you differ from other GOP candidates. But one thing that's really stood out to me, Vivek, is just how complimentary you are toward, one of your, I mean, political opponents since you're running in this primary, Donald Trump.

Now, a few months ago, Trump posted his reasons for liking you so much, saying on truth, social, quote, the thing I like about the vague is that he only has good things to say about President Trump. And to be sure, you have been incredibly complimentary toward Donald Trump, which leads me to wonder, why exactly would likely Republican voters decide to vote for you over the former president? Yeah, look, I think that the more he's being unjustly prosecuted and really attacked using the levers of the justice system, the more I felt a sense of obligation to stand up for what is right. And I also believe in judging based on results. What are the results that I ultimately judge a president by, did you keep us out of wars? And did the economy grow under your wash? There's a lot of other things that matter too, but those are two easy metrics. And I said he was the best president of the 21st century. That's what I said in the debate stage, I stand by it. George Bush, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Donald Trump.

It's not even close, which one was the best one of the century. And so I respect him and probably more than any other GOP presidential candidate. When I'm president, I will respect his legacy and honor it more than anybody else will. Because I think it's the right thing to do and I think it moves the country forward. Yeah. However, I have something that he does not. I am young. I have fresh legs. I think it's going to take somebody coming in from the outside to have the true fresh perspective

to lead the America First movement to the next level. I think I can unite this country by reaching the next generation of young Americans that have lost all semblance of national pride. And I can give you statistics to back that up. I mean, 60% of young Americans today say they would sooner give up their right to vote than to give up their access to TikTok. We have a 25% recruitment deficit in the U.S. military, less than 16% of Gen Z says they're proud to be American. And I think there is no question which Republican candidate is, you know, really which candidate period in this race is best reaching young voters at a large scale. We sit in college campuses across this country. And so yes, I think I will be able to reach that next generation and

inspire national pride in that next generation better than anybody else in this race. So Vivek, you're saying then by definition, you're running against him, you are better than the best president of the 21st century. And that the main reason why you're better than Donald Trump is because you're younger than Donald Trump. Am I understanding that right? And because as a function of being younger, I'm going to be able to reach the next generation, reunite this country. And I do think that reuniting this country and reaching the next generation will be part of what allows us to take the America first agenda. to the next level. I got you, but I won't be the same person. Yeah, right? Well, I wouldn't be running if I didn't think I was the best candidate for the job. So yes, I believe I am the best

candidate for a U.S. president. I think there are two America first candidates in the race. And I do think it has to be an America first candidate that leads the country forward. However, between it's the tried and true, I admit, if you want tried and true, you go with Donald Trump. If you want the next generation with fresh legs to lead us forward, you go with me. And I think that that's going to be the successful formula that leads us to success in this race. I'm gonna follow up on something you said earlier. You said that you would pardon Donald Trump on these unjust charges. So if you pardon them on taking national secrets without permission, not returning them, lying to the FBI, et cetera.

Does that mean that Joe Biden is allowed to do the same thing? That he could just take national secrets, show him to anyone he likes. Even after he's president, he could just take the documents, bring them home, show him to anyone he likes. And maybe other people too, anyone who's got access to national secrets, can they just show them to everyone? Or is it just a special privilege that Donald Trump gets to have because you like him? Well, it is a, whether you like the law or not, I believe in this thing called the law. And the law does give a, what's that? I said, I'd love to see it because Donald Trump has broken about a dozen laws and you'd say you'd pardon them on every one of those

criminal actions. So okay, prove it. I think that I think part of the reason why is that those laws that he, that are alleged to be broken, I don't believe have been broken here. If I did believe that and believe it was definitive, then I wouldn't adopt the position that I do. Every case brought against him levels a novel legal theory never before used. So for the particular case that you asked about, and I believe in getting into details, details matter. If you're going to convict somebody criminally, yes, the details doggone well matter. So the presidential records act explicitly lays out the criteria for what documents a prior president is and is not able to access. If you don't like the law, change the law. But part of the reason is that we already entrust the

U.S. President with making all kinds of incredible judgments, whether or not to use nuclear weapons on down. So yes, that same president we do entrust when leaving office with access to those same records. The judges have interpreted it. And even in the Clinton sock drawer case as it related to Bill Clinton. revealing undoubtedly classified information afterwards, a judge explicitly came down on interpreting that statute. So I believe the matter of detailed articles in the Wall Street Journal and elsewhere, but why am I bothering talking about it as opposed to legal scholars elsewhere, let them debate it? My job is to unite this country. And I do not think it sets a good precedent when the president of the United States and the Justice Department under him uses police force to indict its political

opponents in the middle of an election and then issue gag orders to say that that opponent during the presidential election can't even talk about that relevant set of issues. I just don't think that's a good precedent and I don't want to see that in one direction or the other. That's wrong. Do you believe it's a good precedent to implement a slate of fake electors to overturn the results of our democratic process and go against the will of the American voters? So look, I think that there were serious issues that need to be discussed, relating to election integrity. However, I would not have made those same judgments that Donald Trump does. This, though, belongs to the voters. This is a judgment for the voters of this country,

not a judgment for a justice system that lands people in prison as its ultimate goal, especially political opponents. I just think that's bad for the United States of America. So leave it to the voters. Trust the voters to make the decision of who governs instead of trying to take it out of the voters' hands. And I don't think that should be a controversial idea. Yeah, it's definitely controversial because what you're saying is, leaving it to the voters, this controversial is no, no, no, not that, hold on, hold on, hold on. When the former president broke laws, including going against the will of the American voters by implementing a slate of fake electors, which were noted as such in memos passed around

within the Trump campaign, they were referred to as fake and fraudulent electors by Trump's co-conspirators. That is part of the evidence. Another piece of evidence that I think is compelling to say the least is that they had fake electors in the state of New Mexico, which had absolutely no pending litigation in regard to election fraud. We have a court in a legal system. And if you want to go into the details of this, the First Amendment absolutely protect. And courts have held this for a long time, dating back to a case called Alvarez, I think it was in 2012, that political officials, including elections, including candidates for election, unfortunately, like it or not, have the First Amendment right,

not to tell the truth. That's just a fact. It's not something that we should necessarily. So Donald Trump was lying. So Donald Trump was lying. I, that's for the courts to decide. But what I'm telling you guys is- So then he should be tried. If it's for the courts to decide and we live in a country of laws and he's being charged with a very important criminal act, why do you get to decide instead of the court system and say, oh, just let him off. Who cares with that evidence is? Because nobody else has been charged under the same set of facts. Because no one else tried to do a coup against America with a fake electorate. Do you know a second person who's ever been accused of that?

We've had contested elections dating back to the late 1800s in this country. Yeah, but no one ever did fake electors and tried to do a coup, Vivek. So are you saying because this is really important because good for the goose is good for the gander. So you're saying, Joe Biden on his way out, can take any national secrets and show him to anyone he likes. He can maybe you can even sell them, whatever. He can just take them. Who cares? You can sell them. And hold on.

I'm pretty clear about this. You can sell them. Okay, all right. But if Donald Trump was telling them, are we allowed to try him then? Or do we just have to let him go no matter what he's charged with? We're going to be on for most of an hour. So I think it's just important for you to understand something about me. I care about the details.

Facts actually matter. I don't care about the details as well. And you just implemented a law having to do with political speech of a president and extended it to the actions of the president. If the actions of the president are criminal, he should be held to the same. Excuse me, I'm still speaking, can you please let me finish my statement? Yeah, okay? With the actions of the president happen to be illegal actions, especially in the context

of our democratic process, you genuinely believe that that individual should not be held accountable for what he engaged in. You think that any former sitting president of the United States could attempt to steal elections, can attempt to implement fake electors, and go against the will of the American people. Is that what you're arguing here? And I just want to address you correctly, what's your name? I mean, you just came on my show. You don't know my name?

I don't actually. I thought I was talking to Jenk. What's your name? My name is Anna, Anna. Anna, good. No, we're gonna be chatting for a while. I just wanted to address you conversation. You're prepared for the interview ahead of time.

So Anna, you guys invited me on your show. I'm making some time for you guys. I'm happy to have open debate. Let's get some facts actually straight here. I thought you were detailed oriented. I don't know. You are making. I didn't mean that as a personal affront,

Anna, I promise you. And I'm looking forward to getting into substance. forward to getting into substance with you. So the reality is you're making an assertion that he broke the law. And then everything that you're doing is working backwards, making a legal judgment on a complex legal theory that has never been brought against a defendant in American history. So that's a circular reasoning. It's a circular loop.

No, no, it's not. That doesn't make any sense what you're saying. Vivek, we're not making this legal theory. But Vivek, you're going in circles. Hold on, let's be clear. So we're not making the assertion. Prosecutors are making that assertion. And you're saying, do not let the prosecutors do their job.

Foreclose that, I don't want to discuss this. Hold on, hold on, let me finish. Let me finish. So can Joe Biden do a fake electors scheme and just make up electors and declare himself president as Donald Trump wanted to do? And you admitted earlier, he is lying. Donald Trump was lying. And so can Joe Biden lie and say, I've got fake electors, and I'll even call them fake electors, and then you're not allowed to prosecute them, because you just said, that's

it, no one's allowed to prosecute former presidents. Go ahead. So is Joe Biden allowed to do the same exact thing? Let me just ask you guys a question, because I think I'm getting a sense for your command of the details here. Which case would you like to talk about? Fake electors. Go ahead, fake electors.

Is Joe Biden allowed to do the same fake electors team? documents and one of you is talking because he broke so many laws but let's think with fake electors go ahead which one would you like to discuss fake electors go ahead yeah so there is no crime here that can be charged that's the answer there's no relevant crime now can voters take this into account when determining who their next president is absolutely that's exactly how our process works but our constitution has a process that has been followed and it was followed here and the U.S. president, absolutely, even if he's the outgoing president, has an opportunity to chair his opinion, even if those opinions are not true. And if that's found in a court of law,

I don't have a view on that, but that's what the allegations are. That's what a court of law is, but you're saying we're not allowed to go to a court of law. I'm not saying that you're not allowed to. I'm saying that I would pardon him, because I think that these do not match the actual law that the Supreme Court has held applying to these set of facts. And I think it's a bad judgment for the U.S. Justice Department to bring this case because it divides the country and it sets an awful precedent that will now be used going forward for years unless we do something about it. Unless it takes a leader who actually unites this country, this is the new precedent in the United States of America. The new precedent

is the party in power will look at who the opponent is and throw the legal statute book at them. That's not how it's supposed to work. You're supposed to find a crime and then decide whether or not you want to prosecute it according to the same standards you use for every American. That is not what's happening here. And there is little doubt that if Donald Trump were not running for president, they would not have brought these charges. So I think that if you ask me, does this move towards uniting the country or not? I think it does not. I think it moves towards dividing the country, which is why I have been clear, even though I'm running against Donald Trump, I would pardon him if I'm elected president because that will move this nation forward. And I do not think that we

should be guided by vengeance and grievance against one man. I do not think that that helps the United states of America. That's why I'm in this race. And that's why I clearly answer your question. You asked me, why would I pardon? That's why I would pardon. And just to be clear, you have absolutely no problem with the Trump campaign implementing fake electors in the state of New Mexico, which had no pending litigation in regard to election fraud. You're okay with that. There is a difference between what I've made the same judgments. Yes or no. I don't think that's illegal. I do not think that anything that's been laid out. Okay, you don't value our democratic process. I don't think anything that's laid out has been a violation of the law.

That's what I believe. That's amazing. Okay. All right. About four months ago, the Daily Beast reported the following. Trump and Ramoswami had dinner at Trump's New Jersey golf club in the summer of 2021. Are we going to talk about ideas or is this just some sort of like slug fest on some sort of Trump.

I'm trying to understand your motivations for running because it appears that you're not really running against Donald Trump. I was told. It appears that you are a spoiler candidate who does nothing. compliment Trump and provide cover for his criminality. That's what it appears to be because I don't really understand. You're running against him. I don't really know you but tell me exactly why anyone would

vote for you over Trump when you just present yourself as Trump light and present yourself as his water boy who provides cover for any of bad behavior. Thank you for your thoughtful. Thoughtful. Thank you for your. Brilliant. Very thoughtful. Really incisive analysis into the future direction of our country.

That's what I was in, I've taken an hour of my time this evening, there are important things going on in the world. I'm happy to discuss them with you. I talked, accepted the invitation from Jenk because I thought we could have a productive exchange with different ideas. You don't want to answer the question. You get real touchy about being called out for providing cover for Trump. We can move off of it. Let's talk about, let's talk about the policies. I don't talk about the policies. I'll take this question. Let's talk about the policies. Okay, are you going to keep talking over me or you're going to let me ask a question? I would love to ask a question about policy that matters to the country, please.

You would like to disenfranchise voters between the ages of 18 and 25, you want to increase the voting age to 25 years old. Why do you want to do that? Well, I don't want to disenfranchise anybody, but I do think that we need to revive civic duty in this country. So right now I think we suffer a crisis of national pride in the United States of America. So the same logic that we apply to immigrants who want to come to this country to say that you have to know something about the country before you vote in that country, I think it is fair to apply that same logic to somebody who turns 18 and acquires their citizenship that way. And if not that, then at least to serve the country in some minimal way. So if you ask

me, are we better off or worse off as a nation? If every high school senior has to pass the same civics test that every immigrant has to pass in order to become a voting citizen, I think that will make our country stronger. I think that will make our country more united. I think that will make our voting populace more informed, people more proud to be an American. There was a 10 year old girl who approached me in Iowa last week having heard about this policy and some of the criticisms from the left and otherwise. She printed out the 100 question test. She scored 100%, 60% surpassing score. If a 10 year old girl in Iowa can do it, yes, every high school senior can and should too. That's not a Republican idea or Democrat idea. Now I personally

believe that voting rates amongst young Americans will actually skyrocket once we revive that sense of civic pride and civic duty. I also favor making election day a national holiday. We should make voting in this country a civic ritual, that it should mean something. It unites us to say that we take the time to know about our country, our constitution, and then participate in our republic. And so I'm not saying you have to agree with me on that, but I do think that if you're not going to agree with me on that, then I challenge you to find a better idea. And I'm open to it myself for how we revive that missing civic pride in our country. But one way or another, we're gonna have to think outside of the existing box to do it. And that's part of where

I'm leading the way. So back, I want to ask a follow up on that. I have an idea that I've discussed on the show before. I think that after people leave high school, they can go to the military, Peace Corps, AmeriCorps, etc. I think it unites the country. So I understand I have a different idea. I think that's interesting. Okay, now in terms of the, you know, you say, They need to know civics, but you know that if you knew civics, that this country also has a history of poll taxes, literacy tests, et cetera, to specifically disenfranchise some voters. And so, and you know that the Republicans are losing under 25 year old voters in a massive, you know, way. And that is absolutely clear based on the demographics, on the polling information. So it looks really convenient that all of a sudden you don't want as many young voters, et cetera.

But here comes the question. So if we did your literacy test, your civics test, and it turned out that 80% of Republicans don't pass it, but 60% of Democrats do pass it. So it's a massive, massive disadvantage for Republicans. You just can't get your ignorant young folks. It's a hypothetical. Ignorant young folks that are Republicans to pass any of these tests. Are you still okay with saying, no, 80% of Republican voters that are young?

You can't vote because you're too ignorant. I'm okay with it regardless. And I think that the reason we apply the standard is think about the logic. The poll taxes, a lot of those were made with the explicit purpose of disenfranchising specific groups of people at a point in our national history when we were coming off of some inequitable treatment historically in the eyes of the law. Thankfully, we've moved up forward this country many decades past where we were even in the civil rights movement. Now today, we do, I will remind you, there's a reason why we require every immigrant to this country to know those things before they vote.

That's a good thing, by the way. I think that's important. But that same logic, if an immigrant knows has to know it in order to vote, I don't think it is wrong to say no matter what your skin color or what your political affiliation, you should know the same things about the country at minimum. to vote. Okay. And to those for whom you say tests aren't everything, there's a separate point I've built in six months of service to the country in a first responder role or a military role. But the point is, you've got to have some skin in the game or else you really have no way to play in the game. I think English should be the only language at the voting box. So if you if you don't know, if you don't know that there is no such thing as fake electors, then I guess we would disqualify almost all Republican voters, right? Look, I think that you could take that civics test, see how you do.

I challenge you to do it. My sense is my guess you'd probably do it pretty well. I already took it. I'm a different view. So yes, I killed it. Good. So you'd have a- I crushed it. And I guarantee you I would do a much, much better than-

So you yourself were an immigrant to this country. Great. My sense is that many people find this a little too frightening until they take a look at it. And then you say, hey, if somebody's voting for president of the United States, do we think it's important that they- One of the hardest parts of getting older is feeling like something's off in your body, but not knowing exactly what.

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Visit happy mammoth.com today and get your old self back naturally. know what branch of government the U.S. president leads. I think most people think that's a legitimate thing. I don't think Donald Trump knows that. Are you positive Donald Trump would pass your test? He took a dementia test and thought it was an IQ test. He thinks you could suspend the Constitution for no reason. I think you guys have an obsession with one man.

I'm sorry, that's the greatest president of the 21st century. I think I'm interested in the future of the country, but I'm not, I'm not interested in particularly psychoanalyzing another individual who seems to be your obsession. for the day, when there's actually a lot more to talk about. I don't know why you're even running, yes, and when you say he's the greatest. But let's take a break here. You've offered your thesis. Yeah, that's okay.

We're going to do policy, including a policy I agree with Vivek on when we come back. Stay right here. Now I'm going to do something very different here and read some one star reviews of the Young Turks on Apple Podcasts. Donnie Franchise said, pretty much it's like listening to a trash compactor. Someone else said negative anti-American propaganda. And others said, out of context, misquotes, typical leftists who are afraid to debate, just smear. These two would be perfect for CNN or MSLSD.

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that happened throughout the country. Black Americans are hurting. Minorities in this country are hurting. We always talk about starting from the bottom up, but the problem is the bottom up is always the least amount of power. No one cares about them, and until someone actually cares about them, then we'll do something about it. Please, for God's sake, America, understand, acknowledge, and work towards getting to a new reality

where black lives actually matter. Thank you. I'm a co-host on the show, Anna's not only the main host, but she's the executive producer of the show, as she invited Vivek Raviswami to be on. All right, Vivek, you- Thank you for that. Yeah, Vivek, you've said on the debate stage that the other candidates were bought and paid for. Now, that's the thing that I very much agree with, and not just about Republicans. So, but you seem to have waffled on that from debate to debate. But we're here, so you can clarify.

So when you say bought and paid for, what do you mean by it? Yeah, I mean that these are actually mostly as I've gotten to know them. It's less waffling, but more my view has evolved a little bit. I actually think that most of them, not all of them, but most of them are good people, but they have been tainted by a broken system. So what do I mean by that? I mean, it's a lie that there's actual limits to what you can give to a political candidate. The myth is you can only give $3,300 per cycle in the primary and in the general election.

That's false. The reality is most of the election, look at the primary, look at elections these days, period. They're being run by super PACs. That's where most of the money is being spent. And big donors can give unlimited money to super PACs. And even though those super PACs are basically running the campaigns, that's corrupt. And so I think it is a lie that we have the system, you know, $6,600. is a limit. That's a lot of money to most people in the country and fair enough. But you're not

going to control a politician with 6,600 bucks. That's why we have that limit. And yet, what you actually have is the real system that does control the politicians, which are the super PACs, technically these independent agencies or these independent entities that are spending that money, but they're not really independent when the candidates themselves show up at the fundraisers hosted by the super PACs, regularly talk to donors on speed dial who are getting, giving to those super PACs, turns the politicians into circus monkeys. And is the circus monkey a bad monkey? No, it's not. It's just doing what it's supposed to do. It jumps as high as its master tells it to jump. That's the way our political system has run,

frankly in both parties. And so I think that that's a cancer on American politics, whether or not I agree with the policies that come out of your mouth as a politician, I'd rather they at least be the views that actually represent yourself or the voters you're running to represent, not the donors who are providing your mother's mills. And I think this is hopefully a nonpartisan point that we can agree on. This used to be a calling card on the left. I'm trying to make this part of the America First movement on the right. And I'm actually getting a lot of grassroots support for it.

Yeah. But the donor class does not like me talking about this. And that's why they've come down on me like a ton of bricks. Yeah, I don't disagree with that. But just to be clear, so Nikki Haley and others are circus monkeys who are corrupt. I think that the people who are running in the Republican primary whose money is principally funded by super PACs are really just vessels for their super PACs. That includes Ron DeSantis, Nikki Haley, Tim Scott, anybody whose campaign is principally being spent via their super PAC rather than their campaign. It's just a fact, that's the way it works.

You use stronger language about this, which I agreed with during your interview with Sean Hannity. I want to give the audience a little snippet of what you had to say. Let's take a look. Why would you accuse Nikki Haley of being corrupt? I don't believe. Well, I don't believe that somebody should be able to be the next commander in chief if they have monetized their time in government, going from being in debt to making $8 million through military contracting businesses, through service on the board of Boeing.

Frankly, it is shameful for somebody to be collecting stock options from corporate boards while they're running for U.S. President. Totally agree with you, 1,000% on that, and I commend you for bringing the issue of corruption and legalized bribery to the forefront of the GOP primary debates. I do have to ask, though, one of the issues that was reported on widely

during the Trump administration was how he was directing official government business to Trump properties and then inflating the prices of the hotel stays for government officials and members of the military in order to pat his pockets. Did you at all have a problem with that? So have those facts been reported in the same way that these other facts have been? I don't know. My question though and my answer is I don't care if you're Republican or Democrat,

you should not use your government connections to make money, period. And so what does that mean 10 year ban on lobbying? I favor it. If you leave the government, you should not be able to lobby the government for more than 10 years. Bans on trading individual stocks while you're a member of Congress or anybody else that has information that could move those stocks, that builds public trust. You shouldn't be trading stocks as a government leader or a congressman or a bureaucrat regulating an industry. If you're regulating an industry, should you be able to join the board of a company in that industry? That was the Nikki Haley example I referenced. She did a special deal for Boeing in South Carolina while she was governor later goes on to join the board of

Boeing, a defense contractor. Is on the UN uses connections to generate a lot of military industrial complex connections. Her family then goes off to start a military contractor. So any way of using your government connections to make more money, I think should be banned. Right now it's not banned. So it's not that people are breaking the law by doing it. But I think it is especially bad when some of those same people then come back and run for U.S. president. And that's why I think the likes of the reason I've dialed this up now is that it's one thing if that was just politics as usual. Right now we're escalating our path to World War 3, which I genuinely worry about as a major risk going forward. And so no, I don't think that

somebody who has a demonstrated track record of potentially making money on taking us to World War 3 should get anywhere near the White House, which is why I've been particularly sharp about this issue, even relative to the first few months of this campaign, when those foreign policy threats weren't quite as pronounced. All right, we continue to agree on that. So if someone, for example, was in charge of the Middle East policy in an administration, and then they left the administration and immediately got $2 billion from someone that's in the Middle East, the country that's in the Middle East, that they were in charge of handling policy on, and might have even, according to some rumors,

passed intelligence on to, that obviously shouldn't be allowed to happen. That is massive corruption, right? Well, if somebody is running for president who fits that description, you let me know, but I've been calling out the people who are running for president. So that's Jared Kushner. So are you okay with that? Or is- I mean, I, if I'm judging the first half of this interview is extrapolates to the second, I can't verify all of the facts that you're referring to there. I'm giving you a very clear litmus test. Politicians in either party should not make money off of their time in public service beyond the salary that they're paid. That's a general principle and we should apply it evenly across both political

parties. But where I am up on the details is the people I'm running against president for president against. Facts matter and those are the ones where I have been expressly vocal that nobody who fits that description should be taking us into World War III. If we found out that the Saudis decided to buy the PGA and funnel all of the, or a lot of the tournaments, coincidentally, Donald Trump's golf courses, right after he was in charge of policy with Saudi Arabia, you would be outraged by that. So I don't understand this game of innuendo. I have no idea what facts you're referring to or not.

Okay, here I'll give you another one because, okay, so you're saying hypotheticals, that's actually what's happening in the real world, but I'll give you another one. You said earlier that you're opposed to people taking a super PAC money and you think that's corrupting and it makes them circus money. Again, I totally agree with you. I totally agree with you, okay? So Sheldon Adelson gave over $100 million to pro-Trump's super PACs, and then Donald Trump did all the things that Sheldon Adelson asked them to do,

including getting rid of corruption charges on him, including fighting yes unions, including bringing back money from abroad. Sheldon Adelson's main money was in China in Macau casinos. I don't know how much clearer I could be with you. This is the system in both political parties that needs to end. Now what did I say from everybody, even the people I'm running against in this race? It is legal within the bounds of the law. I think we need to change the law so that we have an even-handed system where you don't have

have a special class of mega donor billionaires influencing what politicians do. Okay, so you are clear. So you're saying it does apply to Trump. So Trump was corrupt when he took his super PACs took over $100 million in both elections from Sheldon-Aiddle. I said the same thing I said at the very beginning. It is legal and that's why we need to change it. We need to change the system where you do not want people to effectively have disproportionate influence on their politicians. So correct. I agree on that. Change the law. What's the game you're trying to play? I don't know, I'm just trying to understand. It is a corrupt system. Yeah, and Donald Trump participated in that corrupt system and

is part of that corruption. That's okay. You're running against them. There's nothing wrong with that. I agree with you. I really don't. The level of obsession, I mean, the Trump derangement syndrome, it's really sad. He's pulling with that's done to the country. Where you're pulling a seven percent. What do you mean a Trump derangement syndrome? Not only that. Look, in this country. But Vivek, you're running against. He's the number one Republican candidate. You're running against him.

What do you mean obsession? It's just befuddling that you refuse to call him out on anything. How many times has George Soros' son visited Joe Biden in the White House? Okay. Probably too many times for comfort. Who cares? My point is. We have no problem with calling that out.

My point is, but my point is it's not useful because you could do this for every politician in America. That's the fact of the matter. And so, as I said in the beginning, a lot of these are, are good people tainted by a broken system. Some of them aren't even good people. They exploited, but most of them I've learned are good people tainted by a broken system. Fix the system. I'm not running against any of those candidates. I know you want me to think I'm running against Trump. I'm not running against any of those candidates. I'm running against that system. And I think that that's something that probably on a day where you're in line with your

principles would agree with. Someone needs to run against that system. It is going to take somebody who is willing to and fortunately the way that works today is every donor who dances to the tune of their biggest donor, every candidate who dance to the tune of the biggest donor, in my case, that biggest donor is me. And the reason I'm running is it's going to take someone for whom that's true to break that system. And I think we're gonna be successful in doing it. One more break. When we come back, we're gonna ask you about your proposals on the federal government. You have some interesting proposals for massive cuts.

And so it's worth discussing. Let's take that last break and come right back. Every day, the young Turks delivers two hours of solid, fact-based, timely news and progressive commentary on all the day's most important stories. We keep our viewers informed while also providing perspective and insight on the news we cover, so you understand not only what's happening, but also what's happening behind the scenes, the stories behind the stories. We play musical chairs and put these children in one awful detention facility to the next. That's what's happening at the border.

The things that got him banned, he's still spreading. So presumably, I think it's reasonable to say that if you allow him back on the website, he's going to do it again. Any legal voter that we deem not willing to vote for my side shouldn't vote because it'll replace me that's supposed to vote for my side. That's not how voting works. That's not how democracy worked. And while many people following today's political news can get discouraged about the direction

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and see what it's like to experience a news organization that only answers to you. I don't care if you're Christian. In fact, I will fight for you to have your religious liberty and practice your Christianity. I believe in that. I don't believe in Christianity, which means that you do not get to dictate the way I live my life based on your religion. I don't care what the Bible says. You have every right in the world. All those women who identify with your religion have every right in the world to not get an abortion to not take birth control, but they do not have the right to dictate my life and what I decide to do with my body.

I don't care about your goddamn religion. I'm so tired of having non-stop conversations about what the Bible says. You live your life in the way that you interpret the Bible. Again, I don't care, but you don't get to take the Bible and tell me, while the Bible says this in this chapter and this verse, I don't care. I don't care. I don't believe in it. And I have the right based on our Constitution to not believe in it. Join the Dragon Squad by becoming a YouTube channel member.

Click the join button below or sign up on t.com slash join to get access to fun emojis, a member only chat, exclusive shop TYT designs, ad free watching, and so many other amazing perks. Plus you get bragging rights for being part of the coolest community on the internet and help us drive real positive change in the world. in the world. The Dragon Squad awaits, so join today. The media can't stop talking about gridlock in Washington, as if a handful of stubborn Republicans are the only thing standing between us and a fully functional democracy. The reality is that our government was taken over by big business and their allies in both political parties. And corporate media adds to the dysfunction. The good news is that the American

people are progressive and soon will take over Washington. My book Justice is Coming is our battle plan for making that happen. You can get justice is coming wherever books and audiobooks are sold. Back on the Young Turks, Anna Kasparian and Jen Cougar, with you guys talking to Vivek Ramaswami, running for president on the Republican side. Vivek, you've proposed cutting giant ports of the United States government at the federal level and at the executive level. So without getting into all of it, let me just name three of them, Department of Education, FBI, and IRS. So to most people, that sounds a little crazy. Are we not going to collect? like taxes? Are we not going to do law enforcement? So tell us why getting rid of the IRS as an example makes any sense at all? Well, I think that's just an administrative reorganization. Downsize it, move it to the U.S. Treasury so it's a revenue collection process. I can tell you with the FBI. I mean, this is the one I get a lot of questions about and I think is the most

understandable pushback that people have. And I can do the education one too. There's 35,000 employees at the FBI, 20,000 of them are in back office functions in the J. Edgar Hoover building in back offices in this bureau. They can go home and find honest work in the private sector. But the 15,000 agents on the front line should be moved to agents like the agencies like the U.S. Marshals or to the financial crimes enforcement network at the U.S. Treasury or the DEA, where they will have far greater specialization and be much more effective than the agents are at the FBI right now in investigating child sex trafficking crimes, which the FBI has not been very good at. The US Marshals has done a better job at. Specialized white collar

investigations where people at the FBI lack the specialization that people at the US Treasury Department's financial crimes enforcement network actually have. And this is also a way of addressing what I see as generational corruption in the FBI. The same Bureau of Investigation that used to go after the likes of Martin Luther King Jr., threatening him with with suicide over improperly collected tapes is now going after individuals of a different political persuasion. And it was wrong then as it is wrong now. Bureaucracy is a formula for breeding corruption. And I think the right answer is you can't just incrementally reform that. You have to shut it down but do it in a pragmatic way that increases effectiveness

while reducing cost and corruption. And same thing with the Department of Education, tilting the scales to four year college degrees over one or two year vocational programs. holding local schools hostage saying you don't get that money unless you adopt certain agendas at the local level. That's not useful when the federal government has nothing to do with local education. I'd say shut it down. Give that $80 billion mostly back to the people to parents so that every parent can choose to send where their kids go actually go to school. And the tiny sliver that relates to vocational training that they've recently added move that to the

department of labor where it belongs. So yes, I do think it's I do think it's going to take somebody with a CEO mindset. And if I may say anti-bureaucracy experience to come in and reorganize and got much of that federal bureaucracy. That's not a left-wing idea or a right-wing idea. But it is a fundamentally American idea because we have three branches of government in the U.S. Constitution, legislative, executive and judicial, not this fourth branch of the administrative state where most of the policy making takes place today. And so I would say that's the top of my domestic agenda, shut down that fourth branch, revive the integrity of our constitutional republic.

So the fourth branch that you're referring to consists of individuals, leadership at least, that's been appointed in the executive branch by the president of the United States. The Department of Education, of course, to give you an example, your favorite politician in the world, Donald Trump appointed Betsy DeVos. And she engaged in the reversal of certain policies, policies of the education department that did seek to help students who had been defrauded by for-profit colleges. So what do you propose happen in a situation in which students have been defrauded by for-profit colleges like Phoenix Online, ITT Tech, they get an unaccredited nonsense degree

that leads to nowhere, they're drowning in debt after being defrauded. How exactly would you deal with those situations with the elimination of the education Department? If it is a true case of fraud, that's a violation of the law. They can be prosecuted under the law. They can be sued in civil suits by the people who are defrauded, no different than any other commercial relationship that exists in the private sector. However, when you have a bureaucracy at the Department of Education that's spending that $80

billion at a moment where school choice programs across the country are underfunded, it's not even close, which is a better use of money. Put that $80 billion budget in the pockets of parents across this country, be about 1.6 billion per state in this union. It's not even close, which is a better use of funds. And I think you avoid a lot of the bureaucratic corruption. And you're right, the people who sit on top of those agencies are appointed by a democratically elected U.S. president. 99.999% of those employees do not fit that description. To the contrary, they're protected by, I think, bad policy, but so-called civil service protections that have stopped

to the US president or the duly elected representatives or even cabinet secretaries from firing those employees, which creates a culture of rot, of laziness, of ineffectiveness, and yes, even of corruption in many of those agencies. And so I have a simple proposition. I think the people who we elect to run the government, they ought to be the ones who actually run the government. And if there are people who disagree with me, if they're the people who I don't vote for, I accept that. But we live in a constitutional republic where at least the people who we who we elect to run the government ought to be the ones who are actually running it when most of the policy decisions made regulating our energy sector to our health care sector,

to financial markets to education come from unelected bureaucrats in the federal government. And that serves neither Republicans nor Democrats nor any American well. And that's going to change on my watch as president. Let's talk a little bit more about school choice. So school choice vouchers, they tend to be statewide programs that take public funding away from public schools and redirects that money to private institutions that do not have to abide by similar standards, education standards that public schools have to abide by. And so how do you consider the lack of standards and how that might play a role in a system in which

voters would not have the right to vote unless in your dream scenario, they pass a civic test? What if those public dollars are being funneled to certain religious private schools that do a poor job in educating their students about American history, civics, you know, the, basically what they need to know, the education they need in order to pass the civics test that you think people need to pass in order to be able to vote? So as it relates to standardized testing as one metric among many, and other metrics also track it. It's actually the reverse that you see that's true. Public schools are are badly failing across this country.

And if you look at the correlation between the schools that spend the most money per students Anna, those are the schools that achieve the poorest results 90% of the time across this country. So the irony is if a parent is moving a kid from a school that spends more money per student to a school that spends less money per student, 90% of the time they're moving to a school that actually has higher achievement as it relates to standardized test and other metrics. So my view, I actually have a somewhat radical idea on this. Let's say it's in New York City where I can give you the actual numbers. It's $40,000 per student per year in the failing public schools to good charter schools or

private schools or even better public schools that are spending $20,000 or $15,000 per student per year. I think that that parent, that kid should be able to take half that difference with them. If you put that in the kids account, invest it normally, that kids graduates with a quarter million dollar graduation gift. It's not even close what accounts for a better use of money. Now, here's the problem, those schools that are producing those poor results, they have one constraint that a lot of those private schools and charter schools don't.

Those are teachers unions. And so I've had actually both experiences in my own life. I went to a not great public school first through eighth grade. And then my parents decided to work extra hard and make some sacrifices to be able to send me to a private school for high school in Cincinnati. Just look at the last several years and the the COVID pandemic, the Cincinnati public schools were closed for a full year and then almost a full next year. This high school that I went to, there were four total days that were closed to the entire time. So it's not that COVID only affects kids at public schools or teachers at public schools. To the contrary, these teachers unions are failing our kids, failing the very

constituents, the very members of the public they're supposedly serving. So yes, I do think competition, there's no perfect solution, but I think competition is the next best solution to perfect. And that I think is going to hold the public schools teachers feet to the fire, get rid of those teachers unions. And yes, we ought to compete such that our educational system goes back to being about the achievement of our students rather than employment opportunities for these union members. And that's just the hard truth. Yeah, I would love to debate you on that, but that's not what we're doing here. So one last question of the time that we have. You've said that you're against secularism.

So which religion should rule us all? None. That is the answer. Well, isn't that secularism? That's not secularism. I think that capitalist secularism is something that has used a substitute religious-like worldview to foist that affirmatively onto multiple institutions across this country. I think that there are many forcible agendas. If you have to pledge allegiance to a diversity equity inclusion agenda as a function of getting a job, I think that is a Title VII violation, civil rights violation today. So I don't believe that there should be any religion, secular

humanism or otherwise foisted upon anyone, certainly not through the government. My view is you have free expression in the United States. I'm an ardent defender of religious liberty. Whatever you're religion is, you have the right to practice it as long as you're not explicitly harming somebody else. That's literally secularism, Vivek. That's literally the definition of secularism. That's actually, well then, Jenk, what I would say is respectfully, whatever word you use to describe it. Now I've written a whole book about this and so we can debate the vocabulary. But in concept, I believe that every religion should be practicable in the United States with religious liberty as long as you're not harming somebody else. And the government cannot establish any one religion as the governing religion for the United States of America.

Good news. That's simple. So the Constitution says. That's exactly right. That's in the U.S. Constitution. That is why the U.S. Constitution is considered the first secular constitution. But okay, now we've all done on literacy and civics test. Well, look, I think it's in the First Amendment for a reason. Free speech, free expression,

freedom of religious choice, and non-establishment, yes, those are foundational to our constitutional republic. I do think that many of the philosophies that are foisted on kids, the hostility towards schools that may want to adopt certain religious worldviews as private schools, the hostility towards somebody who says if you don't approve of a certain kind of marriage, you still have to officiate that marriage using the state's forced to do it. That's what I mean by capitalist secularism to say that you are forcing somebody to do something that violates their religion using the government's power to do it. That is what I reject. And so call that what you want. It's not the vocabulary that matters. It's the concept. I am against that. And you may disagree

with me on that, but at least we can smoke out where our likely disagreement is rather than worrying about the verbiage. All right, we are out of time. Vivek Ramasami, presidential candidate on the Republican side. We appreciate you join us on the Young Turks. Thank you. Thank you, and I appreciated the latter part of that focused on a great policy debate. Thank you guys.

All right. We'll see you guys some more. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.